Key issues right now for new supervisor
As Stephanie Moulton-Peters takes the office of county supervisor representing the county’s Southern Marin district, her leadership is already needed for a full agenda of long-lingering issues.
Moulton-Peters brings years of experience to the job, having held positions on the Mill Valley City Council and other various countywide boards. She has demonstrated the leadership needed to tackle these issues.
Further increasing enforcement of anchorage rules in Richardson Bay, building community support for a viable plan for long-needed renovations and repairs for Marin City’s public housing and coming up with a plan for the future use of the seminary property in Strawberry are among the issues in which her strong leadership and voice are critical.
f course, another pressing issue and a more recent challenge — and one with more widespread ramifications — is helping the community (including local businesses) recover from a long-lasting public health “lockdown” as a result of the pandemic.
The threat has been real. Earlier this week, COVID19-related deaths since March reached 115 Marin residents. The county has responded, providing financial assistance to services responding to those in need, protection for tenants who have lost their jobs or have seen their incomes significantly reduced and emergency housing for those who need to be quarantined.
The county has a lot of revenue-generating fees and costly requirements. It is time to rethink these to help local businesses — those that provide jobs, goods and services for the community — get back on their feet. A strong commitment to the restoration of Marin’s economy has to be a top priority.
On the other challenges, Moulton-Peters will join the Richardson’s Bay Regional Agency as the county’s representative. Her leadership is vital. In recent years, we’ve seen both an unprecedented increase in the number of anchorouts in the bay and warnings the state will take over enforcement if the RBRA won’t do the job.
The authority has seen a revamping of its organization, hiring an executive director and new harbormaster — changes that have helped lead an initiative to remove unoccupied and derelict boats that have been left anchored in the bay. The authority has also recognized the bay’s anchorouts are a reflection of Marin’s affordable housing challenges. It has brought aboard local social services to help anchorouts relocate to housing on land.
The agency has made recent progress, but it still has a long way to go to satisfy the state’s orders.
The need for repairs and renovations for Marin City’s Golden Gate Village has been debated for more than a decade. Taxpayer dollars have been invested in planners and consultants, but progress has been mired by opposition voiced by many tenants.
The county’s Marin Housing Authority board has repeatedly promised that the work will be completed without tenants being permanently displaced, but there remains a lack of trust — the hurdle has grown as the debate is stirred by questions of racial and social equity.
Certainly, any plan — even those for Richardson Bay and the Seminary land — need to be evaluated through the lens of racial and social equity. Failure to do so simply widens the equity gaps that already exist in our county.
But Moulton-Peters’ leadership is needed to build strong tenant support for a plan.
Finding a compromise for the Seminary property may be even tougher. The property owner’s vision is more ambitious than those voiced by Strawberry residents. Building a vision that fulfills its investment goal and meets community needs, both the neighborhood’s and the county’s, is going to take a lot of effective groundwork. Moulton-Peters needs to bring the stakeholders to the table and find common ground.
Otherwise, the site could potentially become another example of the state’s strengthening attack on local control.
Moulton-Peters is on the job and we’re ready to see some real progress. This is her turn to prove what her leadership can accomplish.